Joey Gilbert is a Nevada-based weed lawyer (yes, that's a real thing) who voted for Donald Trump. Given his line of work, Gilbert says he "took a lot of shit" for supporting Trump, but he doesn't see much reason to worry about marijuana over the next four years. Gilbert even plans on opening a dispensary this month, which he doesn't expect will be hampered by the Trump administration at all.

But others in the weed business are less optimistic.

"I think it's terrifying," said Lauren Davis, a weed lawyer in Colorado. "Not just for marijuana but for fundamental civil liberties for every American."

Trump, for his part, has been fairly laissez-faire about weed. In the past, he's voiced support for medical marijuana and said during his campaign that the decision of whether or not to legalize weed should be left up to individual states. But Davis and others point to Trump's pick for attorney general, Jeff Sessions, who talks about marijuana like someone's really uncool dad. ("This drug is dangerous, you cannot play with it," he once said. "Good people don't smoke marijuana.") If someone like Sessions is at the helm of justice under Trump, then it's possible that marijuana's already tenuous legality could be dealt a serious blow over the next four years.

"I have a number of clients who in the last few weeks have decided that they are not going to go forward with investment purchase or a business plan."—Lauren Davis

For starters, Davis points out, marijuana isn't exactly "legal." Technically, the states that have passed provisions to allow medical or recreational marijuana within their borders are still at the whim of federal jurisdiction, which still classifies weed as a Schedule I drug.

"To say that marijuana is legal in Colorado, just as a blanket statement, is drastically overstating the reality," Davis told me. "It is legal under very limited circumstances."

So legalized businesses like dispensaries or farms already have to be extremely wary, given government equivocation and complex state laws. Those in the industry I spoke to made cautious statements about how the next four years might pan out, especially given Sessions's stance on the drug. George Rask of Odin Distillation, a marijuana processing company, characterized the community's attitude as "watchful, but not worried."

Sessions has said, in the past, that marijuana reform was a "tragic mistake," adding that it is "not the kind of thing that ought to be legalized." And while neither he nor Trump have made any explicit claims to upend the federal government's stance on weed, doing so would be relatively simple: All it takes is a quick signature for Sessions to decide to prioritize the criminal enforcement of marijuana—which could include arresting growers, retailers, and users alike. The lawyers I spoke to were clear that there's no reason to worry about that just yet, or possibly at all. But some told me that weed investors are already getting cold feet about putting money into dispensaries or other weed-related business ventures.

"I have a number of clients who in the last few weeks have decided that they are not going to go forward with investment purchases or a business plan," Davis told me. "People are scared."

Private investment is especially important when it comes to the marijuana industry because the federal status of weed prevents banks from giving out loans. Risk-averse Wall Street types aren't very likely to move funds—potentially a lot of funds—that could get them thrown in prison.

If investors stop funneling money into dispensaries and other business opportunities, it could bring the legal weed industry to a standstill. That could, in turn, cause a boom for the marijuana black market.

"Trump seems to have an infatuation with the law enforcement," said Billy Holder (not his real name) a black-market trimmer who works in California's Emerald Triangle. "If he's supporting the DEA and there's a better push from the federal government to regulate it and fight the state with their laws, it'll probably, honestly, continue to be lucrative if it stays illegal."

During the season, Holder works on a farm in California which he told me he thinks is legal, but gets paid under the table anyway.

"That gray area in the law," said Holder. "It's hard to know what's legal and what's not because there's a difference in the federal and state laws we don't really know the final say."

In general, the consensus amongst weed businesses is that both Trump and Sessions will have bigger fish to fry, and aren't likely to target an industry that is pouring money into the government's pockets. Still, Rask pointed out to me, who the hell really knows?

"If the last year and a half have taught us anything," said Rask, "they've taught us that we ought to be careful with our predictions."

Follow Michaela Cross on Twitter.

When Roger Logan first started noticing an odd growth on his lower stomach about 15 years ago, he went to his doctor in Gulfport, Mississippi. The doctor took a look, told Logan that the growth was "just fat," and sent him home, according to the Bakersfield Californian.

But it wasn't just fat—it was a benign tumor, and it was growing. Over the years, the growth continued to swell, until it was so large that Logan was essentially confined to an armchair. It got to the point where he could no longer run his antique shop or his family farm. Logan then consulted a specialist in Indianapolis, who told him that he would likely need surgery to remove the growth, but it was very risky and there was a 50 percent chance he could die.

After an attempt at surgery failed about a year ago, Logan was so despondent that he stopped eating and drinking water and wound up in the hospital for liver failure and dehydration. That's when Logan's wife, Kitty, started searching for doctors to remove the tumor. "She just kept pushing. She wouldn't let me quit," Logan told the Californian.

Finally, Kitty found a doctor in California—Dr. Vipul Dev—who had performed similar surgeries in the past, and Dev agreed to operate on Logan. All the Logans had to do next was figure out how to transport Roger 2,000 miles across the country to Bakersfield Memorial Hospital. Though a member of their church offered a small private plane, Logan opted to travel in the back of a cargo van with his armchair and an ottoman bolted to the floor.

Finally, Logan went under the knife last week, and Dev was able to successfully remove the 130-pound tumor that had plagued Logan's life for over a decade.

Dev said that the tumor probably started as an ingrown hair that became infected, and as it grew, it eventually developed its own blood supply. It became so large that it would drag between Logan's legs, and he was unable to walk.

"I used to equate it, you just put a strap around your neck and carry three bags of cement around with you all day long, just swinging," Logan told CBS affiliate KBAK.

Logan will recover for two weeks in the hospital before returning home to Mississippi, where he will be able to walk, fish, and run his businesses once again. As for the armchair, Logan reportedly plans on getting rid of it as soon as possible.

Shortly after billionaire GOP donor and charter school advocate Betsy DeVos was confirmed as education secretary Tuesday, dozens of students in New York City left their classrooms to protest in Manhattan's Foley Square, Gothamist reports.

Students from NYC area high schools, as well as some colleges, braved the afternoon rain and chanted against DeVos and President Trump's controversial immigration ban, which is set to be argued in a federal appeals court Tuesday night.

"Betsy DeVos was confirmed today despite her shameful inexperience and complete lack of understanding for the very job she seeks," one student could be heard saying in a mic, according to Gothamist. Students also held up signs that said "ban walls, not people" and "refugees are welcome here."

Both Republicans and Democrats, as well as public and charter school advocates, have voiced their concerns about DeVos's capability to run the Education Department, with little experience in public and higher education policy matters. She was confirmed by a historic tie-breaking vote Tuesday, after Vice President Mike Pence had to cast his vote to sway the confirmation in her favor.

The walk-out was reportedly planned by 17-year-old Hebh Jamal and co-sponsored by the New York Immigration Coalition, Arab American Association of New York, and MPower Change, according to the Facebook event. The event calls on students in the area to "rise up against bigotry, hatred, and prejudice," specifically in regards to the president's immigration ban, which bars all refugees and immigrants from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering into the country.

Check out footage from the protest via act.tv below

By the time Christopher Bisbano had saved up enough money to buy the flimsy nylon string guitar the former musician had been saving up for in prison, he was too strung out and depressed to play it. More than a decade into his 23-year attempted murder sentence at the California Rehabilitation Center (CRC) in Norco, California, Bisbano's resolve to get clean and return to his family had withered along with his 6'6" frame, which, after nearly four combined years in solitary confinement, bowed in at 168 pounds.

"You start to feel like an animal," says the 49-year-old Bisbano, adding that at one point, he went 16 months without stepping outside his cell. "It's an environment where the culture is defined by humans and inmates. I'd purposely drop my food tray so they'd give me a second one, and eat the food off the floor later. After awhile, you start to believe that that's what you're worth."

Then he met MC5 guitarist Wayne Kramer, who arrived at CRC in 2009 looking to expand his music equipment nonprofit, Jail Guitar Doors. Kramer asked Bisbano if he'd be interested in teaching a class. A few weeks later, Bisbano sat at the head of an abandoned substance abuse counseling room, surrounded by 14 inmates cradling donated guitars.

Read more on Noisey

As illustrated by numerous late-night Jimmy Kimmel spoofs, it's clear that there are still a lot of people in this country who are confused about what Obamacare is and what it does. However, thanks to a new poll, we now have a solid statistic—a third of Americans have no idea that Obamacare and the Affordable Care Act are actually the same thing, the New York Times reports.

The Morning Construct survey polled 1,890 adults online and found that 35 percent of them either thought the two names belonged to different polices, or said they didn't know that they were names for the same healthcare law. Perhaps more worrisome, young people between the ages of 18 and 29 who made less than $50,000 seemed the most confused about Obama's signature healthcare act—a major demographic that the bill was designed to help.

Maybe even worse, when asked what would happen when "Obamacare" was repealed, roughly 44 percent of people did not realize that would mean a repeal of the Affordable Care Act—12 percent said a repeal of Obamacare would not result in a repeal of the ACA, and 32 percent said they didn't know. That means almost half of all Americans don't understand what would happen if Republicans went through with their plan to "repeal and replace" Obamacare.

Additionally, 39 percent of people didn't know or incorrectly answered that Medicaid subsidies would not disappear if the Affordable Care Act was repealed, according to Business Insider. While 72 percent of Republicans polled knew that Obamacare was another name for the Affordable Care Act, only 47 percent of them said Medicaid coverage and subsidies would disappear should it be repealed. On the other hand, 79 percent of Democrats said Medicaid would be affected, something Bernie Sanders has vocally warned against while using a giant poster of Trump's tweet on the Senate floor.

Although a large chunk of Americans are still clearly confused, they may have some time to educate themselves before Congress makes any moves on a repeal. Donald Trump had called on Congress to make repealing the Affordable Care Act a top priority, but now Republicans are reportedly looking into repairing the bill, rather than scrapping it altogether.

According to the Morning Construct poll, 45 percent of Americans approved of Obamacare, and 46 percent said they disapprove, despite widespread confusion over its name.

Before smartphones, arriving in a new city as a gay guy meant engaging in detective work to find other queers. Depending on the era, that might have meant using weighty gay travel guides like Spartacus, scouring the web, or simply using one's "gaydar" to find places to meet other gay and queer men and women.

All that's changed thanks to gay dating apps. In most parts of the world today, one can fire up an app like Grindr, see a grid of other nearby gay, queer and trans people, and start a conversation with one (or dozens) of them. Where it leads (sex, networking, a new friendship) is up to the participants. And as gay spaces continue to close around the world, dating apps may soon be all that's left to replace them. Grindr alone boasts over 2 million daily users today in 196 countries. Its Chinese rival, Blued, is drawing similar daily numbers, and claims to have over 27 million registered users in total.

But it remains to be seen whether these apps will be able to replace the myriad functions gay bars serve in the LGBTQ community. By their very nature, apps strip people of the depth of first impressions. When you "meet" someone on an app, they're reduced to a narrow band of information—a few photos, their "stats" (age, height, weight, ethnicity, relationship status, sexual preferences, etc.), and the awkward sorts of conversations that can result when chatting with strangers with little more than that to begin with.

It's no surprise that gay dudes often complain that apps are too sexually-focused—which makes sense. While some definitely use apps just to find friendship and establish ties to the queer community, when platforms reduce users to pictures and physical characteristics, it's natural that people will treat those platforms like a meat market. And while gay bars have been said to feel like meat markets themselves (the comparison is sometimes uncanny), gathering queers in a physical space fosters unexpected encounters, where people can't be filtered out by their stats. Plus, gay bars provide a place for the queer community to raise awareness of issues that might affect it, or to hold fundraisers and events for its causes and organizations.

For some, the decline of the gay bar isn't necessarily a bad thing, as it provides new opportunities for connection in more diverse settings. "I'm rather glad that gay bars are closing down," said Darren Jay, a 36-year-old self-described "post-gay global nomad" currently living between South Africa and Berlin. "For me, it's a sign that sexuality is becoming less of a defining quality about a person. It's a sign of acceptance. I'm drawn to mixed venues, where revelers have access to a safe space and the prospects of an evening out hold more surprise."

Jay says that gay dating apps have been central to his sexual life since he first came out of the closet. "I've been using dating apps since I was 18, so that's half my life," he said. "Many gay people see the gay scene as a safe space to be themselves, whereas I've increasingly viewed it as a sort of ghetto. I took to online dating as a way of learning a little more about people before I would meet them. I came to learn that expectations were counterproductive, and began to accept these apps for what they were—a meeting space where anything is possible." In response, he refuses to assign spaces any specific purpose—apps and bars are places of equal opportunity to him, where friends or more are free to develop.

But for some gay men, apps haven't proven to the best place to build meaningful social networks or make friends. Mark Asbury, a 55-year-old American PhD student who moved to Australia on a student visa without any queer friends in 2015, says he's found it easier to kindle friendships on sites like Meetup, which can connect users with local LGBTQ groups.

"I've never made a friend through dating apps," he said. But he has established a group of gay friends through groups dedicated to queer meditation, gaming and non-sexual, all-gender nudist nights. "I more or less signed up for all the Melbourne LGBTQ groups, and then check the calendar and go when I'm interested."

Others find gay bars irrelevant, if anything, in our digital age. "Who goes to gay bars anymore?" asks Jim Buckell, a 58-year-old Australian writer who met his current partner on a gay dating app a few months ago. "If you want to meet a gay man in 2017, you hook up online."

Buckell said that for men who grew up in the pre-internet age and are used to the subcultures of traditional gay bars, it takes some adjusting to orient oneself to dating app culture. "Generally, men are there for sex, either right then or in the very near future. But there's some room to wriggle around if you want to make friends—you just have to know how to create it," he said.

Some worry that when gay bars are lost, opportunities for spontaneous interaction between subsets of the LGBTQ community are lost with them.

"Tribe culture has always existed—you know, bears, twinks, beefcakes," said Josh Tsang, a 29-year-old bi-identifying Chinese/Thai personal trainer who lives between Melbourne and London. "I think apps help streamline what you want, but they do close up people's minds about interacting within those groups. It's more of a concern for me that the only gays portrayed in media are white, athletic-looking role models, and that that idea of beauty and attraction might be compounded further when people are using these apps," he said, referring to app filters. Critics have pointed out the problematic nature of such options.

Tsang said he uses apps to make friends, date and find sex all the same. But at the same time, he elaborated that he's experienced his share of racism through both apps and gay bars—and that at least the former can help filter out those racists. An app user once "claimed that because of my ethnicity, I should have been happy that someone was paying attention to me," he said. On the other hand, "I'm bi, and never feel 100 percent complete comfortable in a gay bar, because I'm usually being cruised by 'rice queens' at the urinals, or find that people have no interest in me based on my ethnic background. Apps do help equalize ethnic barriers, as both parties in certain apps can filter out what they like and dislike."

For Dani Weber, a 25-year-old genderfluid drag performer and activist who spent the past 18 months working as a LGBTQ tour guide in San Francisco, gay dating apps are "awesome new places of social connection."

"Being queer means that it's not always safe to just walk up to a random person and start talking to them—you leave yourself open to homophobia and other judgements," she said. "Apps help me to say exactly what I'm about, and let people self-select whether they want to know more. I love them!"

"I'm not super involved in the mono-sexual gay dating scene, but I know there is heaps of racism and femme-phobia," she said. "People won't give others a chance to even say hello, based on their race or gender expression. That certainly worries me. I do think technology is just an extension of our current communities however, so I wouldn't blame apps for an increase in prejudice or isolation—it may simply just make the issues more explicit and visible."

What becomes apparent from talking to a variety of queer people is that the increasing popularity of apps is a double edged sword. While they open up the opportunity to live more sexually liberated and interconnected gay lives, they also carry the threat of turning users into "sofa participants" in the LGBTQ community, just waiting for the next cock shot. The decline of the gay bar is just one of a host of striking cultural changes the global LGBTQ community has undergone in recent years; whether apps can replace them (or whether anyone wants them replaced in the first place) remains to be seen, but for now, they're the best alternative we've got.

James Norman is a Melbourne-based journalist.

I've always had a hard time following instructions. I've bailed while signing up for Blue Apron countless times after thinking of all the steps I'd need to follow; an IKEA shelving unit almost fell on me once because I refused to anchor it to the wall. Don't even get me started with installing my new printer.

But when it comes to poppers, I'm all ears. I'm a huge fan of the popular gay men's drug, marital aid, nightstand staple and nightlife accessory—how could I not be? One whiff relaxes the posterior and imparts a reliable and pleasant head rush. Poppers are like reparations from God to the gay community for eons of persecution; Lord knows we'd be having way less sex if they weren't around to loosen things up for those of us who use them.

While many gay guys are fans of poppers, the majority of users imbibe with moderation. They can be quite strong, and it generally only takes a whiff or two to feel their effects. And they're somewhat risky to use if you don't know what's in yours, so less is definitely more (yet they're relatively safe compared to drugs like alcohol or cocaine). But a subset of popper fans have taken to testing the drug's limits, in a fetish designed to push users to inhale as long and hard as they can.

In DIY tutorials posted to sites like Xtube, Pornhub, and Tumblr, "poppers training videos" give users step-by-step instructions to get the most out of their little amber bottles. They range from a few minutes in length to well over an hour; the general format is akin to an erotic P90X workout video, where a montage of gay-porn clips is interspersed with instructions to inhale one's poppers, hold the "hit," then release. That "hit, hold, release" pattern increases in frequency and intensity as the video plays, with the intensity of the porn accompanying it increasing to match. Skill levels vary from "beginner" videos (shorter hits, shorter "hold" times) to "master."

As I barely have time to keep up with my own schedule, let alone a poppers drill sergeant who wants to dictate when I can and can't breathe, I reached out to poppers training fanatics to see what drives their appeal.

Dom*, a 36-year-old trainee from Texas, said that poppers training videos are his "go-to" for masturbatory entertainment. "I've seen all of them that I can get my hands on," he said—but admits that he doesn't follow their instructions religiously, because, "I feel like that would cause brain damage." He said he has yet to pass out or overexert himself in the process..

One's interest in training videos will vary depending on the type of porn their creators include; like most people, I have specific tastes, and the Andrew Christian twinks some videos worship definitely don't make me want to follow along for 15 minutes. Start out with a hairy daddy while "Spacer Woman" plays, and I'll gladly see where that journey leads.

For someone like me, who isn't completely obsessed with poppers, these videos might not hold much appeal. I can only make it through a couple before I have to throw the towel in. But can my state of consciousness somehow be altered to keep my head in the game? Actually, yes, as it turns out, thanks to a subset of poppers trainers known as poppers training hypnosis videos. There really is something for everyone on Pornhub.

Take this offering on Pornhub, helpfully titled "CUM DUMPSTER (POPPER HYPNO)" (link NSFW, unsurprisingly.) It begins with an assertive narration from an anonymized voice as a "hypnotizing" tone and a Twilight Zone black-and-white spiral animation plays: "Relax," it tells us. "Pick up your bottle. Put it to your nose. Inhale." It then instructs the user to "take ten deep hits," counting them out for us. Soon after, sub-Darude-quality trance music begins to play as a quick-cut montage of messy gay porn flashes before our eyes.

I asked a poppers-training video producer on Pornhub, who goes by the username "Altriak," to share a little insight into his creative process. He said he was initially drawn to the genre because its videos offered a constantly changing stream of porn scenes—but he quickly exhausted the number of poppers-training videos he could find and found himself waiting for new uploads from other creators. Rather than sitting around, he began editing his own, carefully selecting his own unique formula for their aural and visual progression.

"I found the videos that were progressive in terms of what sexual acts they perform seemed the hottest (going from blowjobs, to rimming, to fucking, for example)," he wrote me in an email. "I also found that going from slightly less provocative acts (like one-on-one with condoms) to more provocative (threesomes and groups without condoms) generally helped the rise in intensity as well."

Seems easy enough. But while it may seem easy to string together clips from films that are already out there, he said that finding music to accompany each montage is a task all on its own. "I try to find songs that get even more intense as the song plays--kind of how sex generally progresses," he said. That much I can confirm; the music in these is crucial. I have to admit I was particularly interested in one of his videos over others, because its entire soundtrack was the excellent dark electropop band TR/ST perfectly synched to gay porn. (But to take it from the bad trance soundtrack of most other poppers trainers, their core audience might be closer to the circuit queen set.)

It goes without saying, but using any drug is dangerous, including poppers, and using them for the lengths and durations these videos dictate would definitely raise your physician's eyebrow. Dom suggested they are also fun to watch with other people, so the buddy system may also be appealing to newcomers who are worried about passing out and falling through glass coffee tables, or worse.

That said, we all need something to distract ourselves from this mess of a country today. If a hypnotic, dominating daddy telling you to take a pull on nitrites does it, then hey: Self-care comes in all forms.

Follow David Dancer on Twitter.

US Customs and Border Patrol agents on the Texas-Mexico border intercepted a shipment of almost 4,000 pounds of marijuana last Monday. But this weed wasn't packed inside garbage bags or separated in bricks—it was ingeniously packaged to look like 34,000 key limes stashed inside a commercial shipment, CNN reports.

"This is an outstanding interception of narcotics," Port director Efrain Solis Jr. said in a statement. "Our CBP officers continue to excel in their knowledge of smuggling techniques which allows them to intercept these kinds of attempts to introduce narcotics into our country."

Border Patrol agents noticed there was something amiss about the tractor-trailer hauling the "fruit," and ordered it to be inspected a second time. An imaging inspection system and a K-9 team rooted out the problem during that second inspection. US Customs officials value the shipment at around $789,467, which is a very specific dollar amount for a bunch of weed disguised as limes.

Despite the claim that smuggling marijuana is easy, apparently the government doesn't fall for the old lime trick anymore. Add that to the list of drug-smuggling schemes to avoid, along with disguising pot to look like deformed carrots or just shoving it inside a suitcase and hoping no one notices.

Homeland Security secretary John Kelly proposed some heavy new security measures for international visitors during his Tuesday meeting with Congress, suggesting travelers fork over their social media passwords so the government can take a look before letting them into the country.

The idea comes amid the Trump administration's push for a more extreme vetting process for immigrants, specifically those from the seven Muslim-majority countries that the president targeted with his recent travel ban. According to NBC, the security measure isn't set in stone yet, but just one of a few the Homeland Security Department is considering.

"We want to get on their social media, with passwords: What do you do, what do you say?" Kelly reportedly told the House Homeland Security Committee on Tuesday. "If they don't want to cooperate, then you don't come in."

Kelly also floated the idea of gaining access to potential visitors' financial information, to better lurk on them before deciding if they should be allowed in the country. "It applies under certain circumstances," he said, "to individuals who may be involved in on the payroll of terrorist organizations."

This isn't the first time border agents have wanted access to people's Facebook accounts, but the act of requiring individuals to hand over their passwords is some next level shit. Doesn't Kelly realize you can learn a lot about a person just from checking out their profile picture?

Two years after his return to the screen as a bonafide action star in John Wick, Keanu Reeves returns as the titular assassin in John Wick: Chapter 2. Picking up where the original left off, Chapter 2 provides a relentless stream of adrenaline, as the taciturn-yet-deadly Wick once again emerges from retirement to embark on a breathtakingly violent murder spree. The mythology of Wickworld is expanded: Audiences are introduced to the High Table—an international council for the world's most fearsome criminal organizations—as well as a marker Wick must repay if he hopes to return to retirement relatively unscathed and outside of a body bag.

Wick's debt sends him to Rome, where he gets ensnared in a power struggle between Italian siblings Santino D'Antonio and Gianna (respectively played by Riccardo Scamarcio and Claudia Gerini). Much to Santino's chagrin, Gianna has a seat at the High Table, prompting her jealous brother to cash in his marker and have Wick do away with her. The shift in power sets off an unforeseen chain of events, leaving Wick with a bounty on his head and vulnerable to network of assassins in what becomes a meticulously orchestrated dance of gun battles, bloodshed, and high-octane absurdity.

Wick's enemies include a ceaseless procession of henchmen, but his most complex adversary in Chapter 2 is Cassian, Gianna's head of security, whose loyalty to his boss continues beyond her demise. Played stoically by rapper-cum-actor Common, Cassian brings a sense of nuance to Wickworld. VICE caught up with Common to chat about what drew him to John Wick, staying political, and the importance of being present.

VICE: How did you get involved in this project?
Common: There was some interest in me playing the character Cassian. After I watched the original John Wick, I was like, "Wow, this is a really good movie." I had a conversation with director Chad Stahelski where I let him know that I'm a warrior and how I want to be one of the great fighters, as well as actors, in film. It's a skill to do that, and I knew this world was dealing with a lot of action and fighting. He said I was the right guy for the job, so I was really happy knowing I was going into a world that was going to enhance me with some of the skills I want to bring to film.

How was the training process?
It was the most dedicated, intense, and in-depth process. After all the training—we went through months of training where we went through these different skills we had to learn, whether was jiu- jitsu or knife-fu—you still have to be present. Stahelski is a fighter himself, and if he doesn't like something, he's going to change it on the spot, and you just have to be present and be aware.

In John Wick, you're going with one of the best ever, which is Keanu Reeves. Since The Matrix, we've seen him be one of those dudes who can really accomplish action and gun work. So, for me, I know I was about to be in the land of the best. I already try to eat healthy overall, but it was still a real dedication—putting my mind to it, putting my body to it, putting my heart and spirit to it.

A big part about "being present" is about opening yourself up to whatever happens to come up.
When you get into things, you can start thinking, OK, this is how we planned to do it. But then when you get on the spot, Stahelski may say, "No, this way is better," or he may come up with a completely new idea. That's the one thing I really liked about being a part of this, because I come from a world of improvisation. Whether it's music, or even as an actor, the art of just letting things come out and being present. When you get that in the action world, it's crazy because it becomes more dangerous. If someone changes something on the spot and gives you a five-minute warning and people are tired, you can easily hit somebody with a knife. But I kind of like that rush.

Photo by Niko Tavernise. Courtesy of Lionsgate

The stakes are higher than a dropped joke or a line.
In the scope of things, you're really working with some tough warriors. Ain't no whining about it. When I saw Keanu with injuries and still going in despite how many fights he had to do, I was like, "I can't complain if it's cold, I can't complain about nothing!" He has something that's really samurai about him. He's centered, calm, but there's also a wild beast in there. He has both worlds.

What drew you to the script besides the action opportunities?
I do love this world John Wick creates. It's a world that's fun and has intensity, but doesn't take itself too seriously. It can make jokes about itself. It's the energy I love that was created in the first John Wick. When I read the script for the sequel, I saw they were getting deeper into this world and dealing with other characters. With John, you see this human being who is trying to find his new place in life. You see that he doesn't want to be out there fighting, but he's drawn to what he has to do and has a certain honor.

I also liked that we were going to Italy. I loved that my character was speaking Italian. I love that you were getting deeper into the world of these assassins and learning the codes, the ethics, and the rules.

It's always enjoyable when fictional worlds get fleshed out. Did you do any reading or watching to prepare for the role?
I was really focused on who this character was. Who is Cassian? If you just took the character description, he's the head of security for one of the bosses. But I had to develop more of a history for him, like his relationship to John Wick and toward the people who he was dealing with so that you could feel his humanity. I also did some research into Italian culture since it's in that world and because I was speaking Italian. It was a lot of fun because I felt like I had a little grasp on the language for a little while when I came back to the States. You know, I had more romance to me. [Laughs]

We're living in an extremely tense and frightening time in US history. How can people politicize their everyday actions toward making change?
I think change begins with the perspective you have on things. A lot of people felt we're in a discombobulated energy, but our individual energy can help change the world energy. I think when you get a grasp on that and know that the power that you have as an individual is connected to the creator and all human beings, you can find things that you're passionate about changing. If I'm able to affect you, you might go out and affect ten other people with positivity. You can do change in the world on that level. Also on the same token, finding things that you see injustices in like education, the prison system, or women's rights. It's finding things you identify with or feel passionate about and finding ways that you can change those things. The world has been through struggles before. This might be a unique time in its own way, but the world has dealt with hatred, with bigotry, with rulers who are not prepared to be great rulers. We just have to find the humanity in one another. Marches are beautiful steps. That solidarity is something. When we look at the footage of the March on Washington and Dr. King and all those protests, to know that you were in that crowd is a statement. It's bigger than us as individuals.

Follow Layla Halabian on Twitter.

John Wick: Chapter 2 is in theaters Friday, February 10.

In this new weekly series, I'll be taking a look at one random subreddit every Wednesday. As you know, like snowflakes, each and every subreddit is weird and unique. Within Reddit, multitudes of little communities will form around the obscure and the bizarre, producing their own lore, in-jokes, and even celebrities.

Here are the rules: Each week I click random on Reddit five times. I submit those five subreddits to my VICE colleagues in an informal poll and they vote on it and Badda-boom Badda-bing, I have my topic.

Then I spend a day or two living the subreddit, loving the subreddit, becoming one with the subreddit. So, without further ado, I now present to you our first pick: r/BackYardChickens .

So… have you guys ever seen a cock pecking at goldfish?

I have, it's fucking weird.

I don't really know what I expected when r/BackYardChickens came up but it sure as hell wasn't seeing Chicken Little eating Nemo.

The r/BackyardChickens subreddit was founded five years ago as a sister page to the website BackYardChickens by users ChickenLytle and ADHD, both of whom have been inactive on the forum for a while. After proving my identity to the moderators—apparently they have a problem with trolls (who is going after the chicken people?)—they agreed to talk to me about the subreddit.

"This sub began as something aimed at people who own chickens as a hobbyist or backyard setup, rather than an actual livestock setup for commercial operations," said jrwreno, the main moderator. "There is a big difference between the care for chicken-hobbyists vs actual livestock operations."

Diving into the depth of this subreddit brings up many posts along the lines of "Can you help me identify what breed of hen I have?" or videos of chicks hatching in an incubator. I was told that the "ethos is generally about having healthy, happy birds, and avoiding the industrial chicken factories that can be pretty cruel."

There are also cock jokes, lots and lots of cock jokes. I'll do my best to restrain myself from following suit fair reader, but I can't make any promises.

Nice. Photo via Screenshot.

The posts, at times, can seem dark and rather weird if you're a newbie to the chicken game. People talk in depth about having to kill dogs or snakes that went after their hens or cocks and, as noted above, that video of a cock eating goldfish was posted. There was also one post describing the carnage when a user came home to find that one of her chickens had killed and cannibalized another, which, if I'm speaking honestly, I'm still not really over.

"There was a large limb near the coop and it was very windy, that and predators may have been nearby, it's very likely something either reached through the fence if she were close enough," reads one of the posts. "I was just afraid she might have the taste for blood or something, she was attacking the shovel when I tried to remove the body, could have just been scared though."

Jesus H. Christ, chickens are intense.

Those types of posts are few and far between though, mainly the thread is made up of people who embrace urban farming and their cocks—some to the extreme. Selfies of people with their chickens are a popular upload, as well as tricks and tips for raising and slaughtering their lovely little birds. Logan Modine, a 37-year-old moderator on the subreddit, says that he's raised chickens for years but doesn't come close to some of the people on the subreddit.

"Some people take it to the next level and let their chickens hang out indoors with chicken diapers and other fanciful clothing," said Modine. "When you get into backyard chickening, it's best to not ask yourself  'what am I doing?' it feels right and you just do it."

If you were wondering what a chicken diaper looked like, don't worry boo, Mack's got you.

That's what a chicken diaper looks like, fam. Photo via Screenshot from mypetchicken.com

Jrwreno told me that she owns "anywhere from 30-40 chickens at one time," and "grows about 60-70 percent of all the food we need on a third of one acre."

When she started moderating the subreddit it had only 3,000 subscribers and has since grown to about 18,000 and is very active. Somewhere in between the first post and the thousandth cock joke something happened that happens in many other niche online forums—a cock-loving community was formed.

Jrwreno described the group as "a tight-knit community that enjoys sharing our successes, failures, tragedies, mysteries, and all the goofiness and hilarity that comes with being a chicken owner."

Modine echoed that sentiment.

"A lot of people on the sub keep chickens as pets and when those chickens die, often in ways traditional pets don't, we definitely let people grieve and vent with the community," said Modine. "It's sometimes tough for non chicken-enthusiasts to relate to losing a prized hen to wildlife or a neighbor's dog."

In the end, these people are happy doing what they're doing and want to let other people master cock rearing and I say wave your chicken flag proudly and let your cock crow—look, I still don't really know how chickens work. 

Either way, keep on cocking on you fine chicken folk.

Lead image via Flickr user Olivier Duval

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Seeing as it's a practice built largely upon humility, yoga—be it in Bikram, Hatha, Yin, Ashtanga, or any other variance—can oftentimes be a bit, well, humiliating.

There are few things in life so humbling—so virtuous, so innocent, so unequivocally awe-inspiring—as seeing someone blow chunks coming out of camel pose. Or harnessing the present moment during crescent lunge, while your g-string tourniquets itself around your ass-crack. Nay, perhaps the truest, most authentic embodiment of ego-elimination exists in the passing seconds between falling out of dancer's pose and onto the floor, just as an extravagant flatulent symphony is released from your body, and branded into the minds of the dozens of people surrounding you.

Despite its seemingly serene reputation, there have been many victims to yoga's unforgivingly intense style and etiquette—from Siddhartha Guatama himself (probably), to Canadian rocker Matt Mays (confirmed).

But whether you accidentally puke, poo, or pop a boner during yoga—isn't that really what it's all about? (No). Isn't it about leaving your inhibitions at the door and letting your freak flag fly? (Also, no). The truth is yoga has been culturally appropriated by western society [Ed. note: white women please don't wear a thong to yoga] and turned it from a mindfulness exercise to a glute workout. But regardless of what brought you there the practice of yoga can lend itself to some pretty vulnerable moments, so I asked some people to indulge me.

Here are their stories.

[Insert Law and Order noise]

Annika Borg, 24

I spent an entire yoga class with my thong completely wedged up my ass because at one point I stretched just a little too deep. I was 14 at the time (and also with my mom), so I didn't [even] get any pleasure out of it. Maybe confusing pleasure, but that's about it. I've never had a thong experience like that since.

Yulanda Luka, 26

At the end of class, we normally lay in Savasana for a few minutes, and then after, the instructor will direct us to slowly get up and they'll say a few closing lines and indicate that class is over.

One time, the class ended and everyone was still lying on their mats, or just making their way out. I was one of the first to get up and walk over to put my block and strap away. As I'm making my way across the room, I slip on someone else's pool of sweat, right on my ass. I'm talking straight leg, foot-to-ceiling, right out from underneath me, kind of fall. Everyone in the room gasped and then went silent.

I survived though, and the instructor made light of the situation by commenting on the amount of sweat on the floor and making sure I was OK.

Kelly, 27

I had been doing Moksha hot yoga for a few years and thought I'd try Bikram. I was told it was hotter and more intense. I had just gotten back from backpacking in Central America where I had picked up a bug, and I wasn't feeling the best, but went to a class anyway. Within the first five minutes, we started doing intense back bends and breathing exercises that really didn't agree with me. I scolded myself to hold it together and not wimp out. Sooner than later, I felt like I was going to get sick and went for the door. The instructor advised I stay and follow my breathing, clearly not knowing what was about to happen. All I remember is barfing up a milky protein shake at the front of the room, completely ruining everyone's peaceful state.

The staff were gracious enough to bring me a banana and some coconut water in the bathroom, telling me I could come back in when I was comfortable. Before the class, I had purchased an intro month for unlimited yoga. Safe to say I never went back. Ever.

Brian, 27

During my third year of university, I finally took the plunge and tried hot yoga for the first time. My roommate at the time had been a veteran yogi and was at me to attend, so, I finally agreed. It was an afternoon class after an evening out on the town. Hydration levels were low, but confidence levels were still high.

As per all activities during university, several bong hits would be required before attending our session. We arrived early, but not early enough, as I had to place my mat at the front of the class and could feel the pressure from the eyes of the surrounding yogis on me as I struggled to roll out my mat and lay my towel down. After getting sorted, I was laying down and thought to myself, "this is way hotter than I expected," and how I'm way too high to be here.

I was totally fucked for the next hour. I tried to keep up with my fellow yogis and not look out of place, but [the] constant stumbling, wrong movements, bad timing, and massive pool of sweat surrounding me were clear signs of a man out of his element. At what I would have guessed to be the halfway point, I glanced towards the exit, imagining how glorious the cold air outside the studio would be. If it wasn't for my roommate attending, I would've been out of there. But the chirps [that would have ensued] for the rest of our lifetime was enough to keep me going. I powered through and got more comfortable as the class went on. It ended, eventually, and I survived with a whole new outlook and appreciation for yoga.

Samantha Duff, 26, yoga studio owner

It was a very memorable moment. We were doing hot yoga and everybody was sweating like crazy, and one of our less coordinated students slipped from her mat and hit the ground. There was a loud fart. And then she started laughing. The more she laughed, the more farts came out. It was rapid fire, like a machine gun. We all could not stop laughing. It was hilarious.

Matt Mays, 37

One time in New York, I went to a Halloween class dressed up as a full-on spartan warrior. Brush helmet, arm and leg shields, chest plate, man-skirt. I ended up being the only one who dressed up. You can't leave the room with Bikram yoga, so I had to do the whole class in 110-degree heat. [I] won a free pizza, though, for best costume.

Another time, I tried my first headstand and fell over and knocked over like six babes, domino-style. I haven't tried a headstand since.

Hillary Windsor is a writer living in Halifax. Follow her on Twitter.

Horror has generally been an awful genre for women. Slasher flicks and torture porn have been cesspits of brutality, putting horrible female stereotypes through actual grinders and demeaning two-dimensional virgins to the point of parody. There are exceptions of course, but overall it's not been a great ride for the infamous "final girl." To survive in horror as a woman you've got to be a good girl, a sexual innocent, a stand-in for the male fantasy of the sexy naif. Off-screen, it's no better, with male directors overwhelmingly calling the shots. But all of that is changing. Directors like Karyn Kusama ( The Invitation), Ana Lily Amirpour ( A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night), Jennifer Kent ( Babadook) and Julie Ducourneau ( Raw) are upending the genre and leading a charge of female horror auteurs. A new film XX, is pushing this wave even further by creating the first all-women directed horror anthology, featuring shorts from Karyn Kusama, Annie Clark aka St. Vincent and Jovanka Vukovic. XX premiered to a sold-out crowd at Sundance and is already creating major buzz around its stylishly scary vignettes.

I sat down with Vukovic, who also co-produced XX, to talk about reclaiming horror and why Donald Trump may be the creative spark the genre needs.

VICE: Talk to me about the inspiration for The Box . Because it's one of those films that really sits with you, it really lingers. Where did that story come from?
Jovanka Vukovic: The Box is based on a short story by an horror author name Jack Ketchum. He sort of came on the horror scene in the 80s and early 90s, Stephen King calls him the scariest guy in America. He primarily writes kind of splatter fiction and was known for that. I read this short story in a collection. It really stood out, because the rest of them were so graphic and violent and then there was just this one little Kafkaesque existential horror story, that really read to me like an episode of The Twilight Zone. So, when we were putting this anthology together I thought of The Box. Because it always stayed with me and I thought, you know—this is my opportunity to do a segment for The Twilight Zone. It really feels like it, I think. It has everything except for Rod Sterling like smoking a camel in between, you know, interstitials. We all had the choice to do whatever we wanted and I was the only person, I think, out of the group that adapted a short story. 

 
You really feel for Susan, the lead character, as a mother. Like, she seemed so tired on the subway. She just seemed so exhausted by the process of dinner, every single night. And you get it. You're like: "Oh, ok if he doesn't eat one night it's not a big deal." As a mother yourself, were there moments where you really related to that exhaustion?
Well, in the original short story it's the dad. It's about the dad and about how the dad is the one who's working and can't connect, is incapable of making a meaningful connection with his family. I had to switch the gender of the protagonist in order to fit the mandate of the anthology, which was that they all had to be written by women, directed by women, and starring women in the lead roles. So, I had to switch the genders, but then this amazing thing happened and it suddenly became about ambivalent motherhood. It became about how not all women are meant to be mothers. It became much more personal for me, because I was able to sort of exorcise some of my own issues with my own mom. Yeah, it's just about perspective. It's the same horror story, but it's amazing how you just shift the perspective a bit. We're just seeing the same story from a different point of view. I think traditionally, since 90 percent of all movies made in the last 100 years have been made by men, the point of view has been from their perspective. If you switch those genders of the protagonist and your story falls apart, it's probably not a very good story, right? In this case, it was very easy and we can now relate more to moms. Moms are the ones who are working. We are seeing a lot more stay at home dads.

There's a person that I met, who told me that she had turned 40 and doesn't really know why she had any of her kids. She's like: "I can't stand any of them." That really stayed with me and sort of informed Susan's character. So, yes. The drudgery of routines. The constant repetition. The food repetition. The repetition of like, doing everything at the same time every day. Bed time. Bath time. Can be exhausting. It's really, you know, motherhood isn't for everyone.

Still from 'The Box'

It makes total sense now that you say that, but it just speaks, I think, volumes to how important it is to get those perspectives in. How did the anthology come to be? How did you all get involved?
It all started around our producer's kitchen table. His wife basically had noticed that all the movies he produced with his film company were by men. She said you know: "When are you going to do something about that?" He had noticed that all these women were being passed over for directing jobs on all the anthology films that were coming out. So, being a white dude, he knew he couldn't be the face of something like this, so he called me up. At the same time I had been plotting a crowdfunding strategy to do my own all-women horror anthology. So, it was like the best timing. So, we made a list and started reaching out to people. We made the anthology because there were no all-women anthologies. We made XX in direct response to the lack of opportunities for women in film. Particularly in the horror genre. The horror genre like, isn't inherently sexist, but it's an area in which women have historically been misrepresented on-screen. And under-represented behind it. So, you know, we've been pin cushions and knife fodder, and yes we've also been final girls, but the final girl herself is also a trope. She is not a real person. Like, as amazingly resourceful as she is at surviving and besting the killer, she is still not a real person.
 
Right, she's a virgin, she's the good girl.
Yes, sometimes. You know, the best example, obviously, is Ellen Ripley from the Alien movies. But she started off as a man and Ridley Scott just made her character a woman and changed nothing else about the script. So, that's not how the rest of the final girls usually play out. We're starting to see a bit of a shift now with women writing or directing. We are starting to see what I call feminist horror films. A feminist horror film is just a movie that portrays women as actual human beings. It's not like the women are killers, or we need to turn the genre on its ear. That stuff is just superficial. It's not meaningful. What matters is that women are being portrayed as actual human beings. In all the lifestyles that we live and you know, as damaged as we can be. Or whatever. You know? We need more than these paper thin women characters. So, that was the part of the impetus of putting XX together.
 
There are so few women directors. I hate to trot out statistics, but it's the easiest way to paint a picture of how grim it is. More than 50 percent of all film graduates are women, and yet, less than seven percent of all working directors are women. This is a problem. It's a problem with no easy solution. Even–despite the efforts of the ACLU investigating Hollywood hiring practices and various social activism happening online, the diversity report was just released in female directors. Women directors have fallen by another two percent. So, it's actually getting worse not better.

Is it political?
We are in a political climate now, particularly in the United States where women have a lot to be afraid of so, something like this offers a glimmer of hope to other women filmmakers and to future generations like no matter how bad things look, even with Orange Hitler in power, these women came together and we made the first ever all-female horror anthology. That energy was palpable in the air at Sundance. One of our directors was unable to make it to the premiere because she was marching on Washington. So, you know, we can't help a movie like XX being politicized because, I mean, from its inception, it was political. It was a political statement.

Do you have any advice for people who are just viewers, who read this and go, "I want to help, but what can I do?"
You can help with your almighty dollar. Unfortunately, women aren't allowed to fail in the same way that men are. If our movies don't do well, we go to director jail for a very long time, and so, we need people to come out to see XX. The only way we can get a chance to make more movies is if the movie makes its money back, so I mean, it is a business. We would love to pretend that it's all completely about our creative pursuits, but it is a business, and these companies—these financiers need to make their money back, so yeah. Please go see the movies made by women. It helps us a lot.

Were there any surprises for you in the stories the other directors chose to tell?
I was surprised that all of the stories ended up being about family. That was a total coincidence. I mean, you can read into whatever you want about five directors all doing stories about family, but it just happened by accident. Funnily enough, both Annie [Clark] and [animator] Sofia [Carillo] don't like horror movies. They don't watch horror movies. They get scared of them. They, you know, Annie actually was like covering her face through most of the Sundance screening.

Still from 'The Box'

It seems like women are making a real mark in horror right now from yourself, Karyn Kusama, Julie Ducournau ...
Yes and Ana Lily Amirpour. Yeah. So, there is, right now, there's a small, you know, movement of women feature film directors making horror films and making waves with them. It's still very small though. The horror genre, in particular, has always been a great springboard for us to exercise our like cultural fears. I mean, if you look back at the '50s, we were afraid of very different things than we are now, right? We were looking to the skies and the threat was communism and alien invasion and body snatchers, and you know, loss of our personal autonomy because we were afraid of invasion. And then in the 60s, the concern shifted around the Vietnam War, and so, horror films started to become about fear, you know, of the other and coming from war changed somehow. The 70s, we started to become afraid of each other, and you know, you have the Texas Chainsaw Massacre and the situation where you can drive, you know, a hundred miles away from your home and be a stranger in a strange land. So, you know, with every decade of horror evolves as a really malleable platform for us to talk about what we're afraid of, and so, thankfully, women are finally being given opportunities to talk about what they're afraid of. Naturally, the subject of the storytelling is a little bit different. I don't think what drives the stories themselves is any different than what a male filmmaker would do. It's just the tiny perspective shift that makes it feel so different, and the horror genre is badly in need of new perspectives and women have that to offer in spades. 

 
How do you see horror evolving to react to what's happening in our world right now?
Trump and everything that's happening, the political climate is really great fuel for creatives. I'm really curious to see what kind of horror films are going to emerge out of this time and to be able to look back, you know, ten years from now and see the sort of creative backlash. I mean, one of the best ways to fight things is to make stuff. And people are going to make stuff about what's happening right now. I think we're all really scared. It's not just women. Everybody's really afraid of the potential disaster of a Trump presidency.
 

Follow Amil on Twitter.

President Donald Trump has pledged to end the "anti-police atmosphere" he associates with the Black Lives Matter movement. And the most powerful man in America enjoys at least some audience for that kind of talk: Last year, more than a hundred thousand people signed a petition to the White House calling for Black Lives Matter to be designated a terrorist organization. With a version of candidate Trump's promised Muslim ban recently being implemented—at least until federal judges intervened—it's fair to wonder if the president might be poised to target black activism too, especially given the prominent role played by BLM in some of the early protests against his administration.

If Trump's team does, in fact, choose to probe radical black activists, the FBI, as America's top federal domestic law enforcement agency, will almost necessarily be central to those efforts.

The troubling case of Ayyub Abdul-Alim shows what that might look like.

Abdul-Alim, a 38-year-old black Muslim man, is currently incarcerated at MCI-Shirley, a state prison in Massachusetts. In 2014, he received a four-to-six-year sentence for illegal gun possession charges, but maintains the allegations were punishment for refusing to become an FBI informant. Now 27 pages of partially redacted FBI surveillance records are bolstering at least part of his story, suggesting the feds first identified Abdul-Alim in 2002 as a potential informant who might spy on mosques associated with black radicals of the 1960s, including Malcolm X.

The documents detail the FBI's interest in Abdul-Alim's connections to the Mosque of the Islamic Brotherhood in Harlem, New York, which was co-founded by his late father, Qasim. A 2005 FBI file refers to Qasim as a follower of Malcolm's and suggests he "may have had some involvement with the Black Panther Party." The document goes on to state that Ayyub Abdul-Alim "knows many Imams from his father," and that "the information that he [Ayyub] will be able to provide would give the NYO [New York field office of the FBI] a unique perspective into any criminal activities of present or historical members of the mosque."

Meanwhile, no specific allegations of criminal activities at the Harlem mosque are made and no grounds for suspicion provided in any of the un-redacted portions of the documents—besides the mosque's origins in New York's black radicalism of the 1960s.

According to the documents, FBI surveilled Abdul-Alim for eight years, relying on his alleged ties with radical Muslim organizations and mosques to justify keeping the investigation open. The nature of these ties remains vague, and the groups named as radical—such as the Tablighi Jamaat and Muslims of America—are not designated as terrorist organizations by the US government, although individual members have been involved in acts of violence. On this basis, the FBI describes Abdul-Alim as an associate of unspecified individuals "connected to various IT [international terrorism] cases, to include UBL [Osama bin Laden]/AL-QAEDA."

Spying on Abdul-Alim was apparently seen as legit by the bureau simply because of his loose associations with people deemed "Islamic extremists," which seems like a conflation of the radical black Muslim tradition associated with Malcolm X with the rather distinct ideology of al Qaeda. And Abdul-Alim had a previous conviction for narcotics offenses, which agents may have seen as bolstering their hopes of recruiting him as an informant. (The FBI declined to comment on the case for this story.)

"The files suggest that Muslims with family connections to black nationalist groups of the 1960s and 1970s were, after 9/11, viewed as suspicious, as part of the heightened focus on international terrorism and al Qaeda," explains Michael German, a fellow with the Brennan Center at New York University and a former FBI special agent specializing in terrorism.

The surveillance files were obtained by VICE from a Massachusetts Appeals Court last week, following a Freedom of Information Act request initiated by Abdul-Alim's lawyer.

An additional 39 pages of surveillance records on Abdul-Alim have also been released to him but have not been made public. According to him, they include detailed accounts of his movements and activities, including meetings with friends, foreign travel, work activities, and visits to local shops. Photographs were taken of the health products store he ran in Springfield, Massachusetts, and people associating with Abdul-Alim were identified and may also have been investigated, he claims. Informants were dispatched to the store and his mosque, with one file noting observations of him at a mosque community outreach event to which local FBI agents had been invited, according to Abdul-Alim.

After eight years of surveillance, the FBI concluded that they had gathered "numerous details about Alim's daily activity" but found "no specific articulated threat" in connection to Islamic extremism, according to the files reviewed by VICE.

Slightly over a year later, in December 2011, Springfield police officers arrested Abdul-Alim for illegal possession of a firearm. The cops were members of the local Joint Terrorism Task Force and notified the FBI of the arrest. That's around the time the suspect was offered what one FBI agent allegedly described as "the deal of a lifetime"—to become an informant and thereby avoid up to ten years in prison. Abdul-Alim maintains the gun was planted and that he turned down the offer, putting his faith in an acquittal of the state gun charges at trial. Two years after his arrest, prosecutors introduced a second set of charges relating to a bag of guns police officers say they discovered in an empty suite in his apartment building.

As the trial approached on the first set of gun charges, Abdul-Alim learned that his wife had been recruited as an FBI informant and received cash payments from the government totaling at least $11,949. Nevertheless, the judge in the case, Constance Sweeney, blocked his defense attorney from introducing evidence pointing to the FBI's involvement. In a phone interview from prison, Abdul-Alim said, "To imprison me because I refuse to reveal some information that they think I may have is alarming."

Watch Desus & Mero kick it with Black Panther writer and activist Jamal Joseph.

Black Muslim organizations have been under surveillance by the FBI since at least the 1940s. Like Malcolm X, Abdul-Alim's father may have been spied on as a result of his involvement in black radicalism, and is mother was active with the Puerto Rican youth group, the Young Lords, which was also on the FBI radar. In the era of the war on terror, the focus on Black Muslims intensified again, in part because of the much greater resources available to the FBI. In 1975, the FBI had a roster of 1,500 paid informants; by 2008, the number had increased tenfold to 15,000. And in recent years, FBI training materials have instructed agents to be on the lookout for "black separatist" terrorists.

What remains to be seen is how the bureau—whose director since 2013, James Comey, is set to stay on for at least the initial stretch of Trump's presidency—treats black radicals in this new era.

"Trump's recent executive order calls for regular reports on rates of Muslim radicalization," said Alex S. Vitale, an associate professor of sociology at Brooklyn College and an expert on the policing of social movements. "This requires building an investigatory apparatus that will undoubtedly include increased surveillance and infiltration activities. It is a short trip from this to increased surveillance of left political movements such as those for racial justice, the environment, immigrant rights, and labor."

For his part, Abdul-Alim relates his own experience to the broader context of anti-Muslim suspicion—one that could get worse under the Trump administration. The FBI's treatment of him, he said, "didn't only affect me by putting me in prison. They affected a whole community, a whole neighborhood. People are afraid because they're dealing with the FBI and law enforcement, and we're still dealing with the prejudices that people have with Muslims." He adds that many people assume any Muslim under surveillance by law enforcement "must have been involved with terrorist activity."

Former Massachusetts state representative Ben Swan, who has known Abdul-Alim for more than two years, said he's always seen him "as someone trying to improve the community." Adds Swan, "I think he worked with police to clean up the apartment block where he was working."

Abdul-Alim hopes that the partial release of the FBI documents will help clear his name. "This is a case with every single document that is available to support every single claim that was made," he said. "All someone has to do is take the time to request it and read it."

Abdul-Alim will face trial for the second set of gun possession charges in July.

Netflix has been on a tear rebooting classic TV shows lately. In addition to bringing back everyone's dream science teacher Bill Nye, its latest resurrection is a Magic School Bus reboot called Magic School Bus Rides Again—and this time, SNL's Kate McKinnon will take over the wheel as the voice of Ms. Frizzle.

Lily Tomlin voiced the iconic teacher in the original 90s series, back when schools apparently didn't require a parent's signature before shrinking students down to the size of a red blood cell and sending them off to explore the inside of someone's body or whatever.

According to Stu Stone, who voiced the backward-capped Ralphie in the original series and is producing the reboot, both he and members of the old cast will be coming back. But it looks like Tomlin, who currently stars in a different Netflix series, Grace and Frankie, has handed the red-haired Frizzle over to Ghostbusters star Kate McKinnon.

There's no official release date for Magic School Bus Rides Again, but we do know that the revival is going to be 26 half-hour episodes, involve an even more high-tech bus, and focus on scientific developments in robotics, wearables, and camera tech.

Will Carlos return to make some bad puns? Has Dorothy Ann been keeping up with her research? Is Arnold still bitching and moaning about all the cool-ass shit he gets to do on field trips? Only time will tell.

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